China censors scour the internet for Tiananmen Square protest

Chinese censors scrubbing the Internet of any words or symbols that could be used to reference the Tiananmen Square massacre in the run-up to Sunday's anniversary have a new target in their sights: a bridge in Beijing where a rare protest was staged last year.

As the 34th anniversary of the 1989 massacre approaches, any searching in Chinese for Sitong Bridge on Baidu maps will draw a blank.

On October 13, 2022, white banners with large red characters criticizing the Chinese Communist Party CCP were hanged over the bridge near Beijing's university district in advance of a major CCP Congress.

The road sign of the Sitong Bridge has been removed from the streets, according to pictures posted on social media. The search on Baidu for Sitong Bridge has returned the message: No related sites have been found. It is still possible to search for the bridge using the traditional Chinese characters used in Hong Kong and Taiwan, instead of the simplified characters used on the mainland. And it is still possible to find related locations, such as Sitong Bridge East a nearby bus stop on Baidu.

October s Sitong Bridge banners called for freedom respect and the right to be citizens, not slaves, as well as the removal of Xi Jinping, China's leader who was about to begin an unprecedented third term as the CCP's general secretary. Peng Lifa, who is responsible for the banners, was detained by police just after they appeared, and hasn't been seen since.

He has become known as Bridge Man, a reference to the Tank Man of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989.

Peng's stunt precipitated the White Paper protests, which called for an end to the zero-Covid policy that swept Chinese cities in late November and early December. The unrest was a period of mass unrest that has never been seen in China since 1989.

China is grappling with the Tiananmen Square massacre, a sensitive issue. The discussion of the event, in which hundreds of protesters who had been advocating for political reform were killed by the People's Liberation Army, is strictly controlled.

For years, activists have found creative ways of referring to the event, such as May 35th, a covert reference to June 4th, the number of which are periodically banned from social media.

The character for Si in Sitong Bridge is the same as the character for four, making it particularly sensitive. The anniversary is sometimes called the Internet maintenance day because of the number of websites that go offline.